Category: Spiritual Growth

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What’s Your Secret?

If you’re a ‘Baby Boomer’ like me you may remember the old game show called I’ve Got a Secret. The show aired from 1952-1967 and was one of my parent’s favorites. The format was simple: while the secret flashed on the TV screen for the viewing audience, four panelists took turns questioning the person with the secret to determine exactly what the secret was. A nominal financial award was given to a contestant whose secret could not be guessed by the panel. It was always funny to hear the questions the panel would ask trying to guess the secret.

I write today about secrets because as a recovering addict I have a past of many secrets. Not that my past is still a secret today, but when I was walking in sin and addiction, my life was full of secrets. Sometimes too many to keep up with. Secrets stacked upon lies and lies stacked upon secrets. It was a veritable house of cards that when finally collapsed was actually a relief.

If you’re a woman who struggles with addiction you know the burden of secrets. Satan, our enemy, knows the power of those secrets. His job is to keep us from uncovering our secrets. As long as the secret is hidden it has power over us. The enemy will tell us we shouldn’t tell anyone our secret because they will hate us. He’ll try to tell us that even God hates us because of our secret. The longer we keep the secret the worse it gets. In fact, nothing will get better until the secret is out in the open.

The key is to find a trusted friend or counselor with whom we can share our secret; go to her for prayer and support. Confessing our secret starts the healing process and removes the power of darkness over our lives. You’d be surprised how understanding others will be once you begin to share with them your struggle.

Is any one of you in trouble? He should pray. Is anyone happy? Let him sing songs of praise. Is any one of you sick? He should call the elders of the church to pray over him and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective. — James 5:13-16 NIV

The power of hidden behaviors and secrets can work for us as well as against us. David said, “I have hidden your [God’s] word in my heart that I might not sin against you.” If we hide God’s Word in our hearts by meditating on it and memorizing it we will find a new transforming power that will keep our minds and hearts pure. Jesus taught, “But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your Father secretly. Then your Father, who knows all secrets, will reward you.”

Secrets have a way of being exposed. Let’s use our ability to keep secrets for prayer and meditation. Unlike the game show contestants where the panel is guessing the secret, we will see an unbelievable new power, a power of Light, being exposed in our lives drawing ourselves and others to The Source of our secret.

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The Kingdom of God is like…

I’ve become fascinated by a new television program my son John recently introduced me to called Fringe. It’s a Sci-fi series about a female FBI agent assigned to investigate weird crimes that are seemingly part of a larger pattern. She teams up with a formerly-institutionalized scientist and his son who perform experiments on the fringe of real science.

You, like me prior to watching Fringe, may not be familiar with the idea of fringe science. According to Wikipedia fringe science is a scientific inquiry that departs significantly from mainstream theories. Mainstream scientists typically regard fringe concepts as highly speculative as opposed to frontier science which is plausible science. In other words, fringe science is on the edge, out of the ordinary, unexplainable, goes against the grain of the norm. What I find interesting about this program is many of the concepts and theories have spiritual undertones giving way to incredible biblical analogies.

One specific concept is that of a parallel universe; or as some call it multiverse. This concept implies that along side the world as we know it, there is another invisible world like ours but slightly different. It may mirror what we see, but there are variable changes. Unlike the natural world, in the parallel universe you may have control over the natural laws of physics, space and time.

In a recent Fringe episode Agent Olivia Dunham was able to travel through a portal that took her to a parallel universe. In this universe she was able to see much of the world as it is in her ‘regular’ universe but some things were different. For example, in the parallel universe, The World Trade Center was still standing because in that universe it had not been destroyed.

As usual, after watching this episode, I spent time meditating on the possible spiritual implications of a parallel universe. It dawned on me that as Believers, we do in fact, live in a parallel universe — The Kingdom of God. What is our portal that takes us to this parallel universe? How do we know if we’re in that parallel universe or in the natural universe that we see everyday with our eyes?

Before I became born again, I lived most of my life as a walking dead person, empty with no real purpose, unaware of the anger that drove me day to day. From early adolescent days to recent adulthood, I hid myself from others in the fear that once they knew the real me they would hate me as much as I hated myself. I was riddled with childhood wounds of abandonment; constantly searching for my father’s love and approval. Heavily burdened with guilt from the destruction I had brought to myself and my family; I sought constant escape in nearly every form of addiction possible. I was a textbook narcissist. Life was all about me. No matter how much it hurt those around me I was going to get my needs met.

On Sunday December 26, 2004 at Second Baptist Church in Houston, Texas, I was born again. It wasn’t an overnight transformation that took place but has been a continual work in progress. However, while Bill and I were living in Louisiana in 2006, a life changing thing occurred. God literally removed a veil from my eyes.

I was in Wal-Mart, of all places, when all of a sudden I could see the people. It was as if they had come out of nowhere. It was like the day I got my first pair of glasses at age 13. When I walked out of the doctors office I looked up and saw the trees. No longer were they just a blob of green, I could see the individual leaves!

That Autumn day in Covington, LA, I seemingly walked through a portal. God allowed me to see what He sees. It was like having X-Ray vision. I could see the people. They were no longer just a blur going by in my life. I could see them individually. I could see their pain, their hurts, their need for healing, their need for a Savior. Feeling their pain I was overcome with emotion. With urgency I was convicted to help them. With inadequacy I was overwhelmed by the task. With the thought of being a chosen vessel, I was humbled and awestruck.

In that moment God delivered me from the bondage of narcissism.

I see myself today living in a parallel universe. The world is as it was when I was walking in darkness, but now I see it through different eyes. To live a life in the Kingdom of God it’s critical that I keep God’s perspective at all times. I must keep Christ first and foremost in my life; His Words in my heart and on my lips.

Like watching a 3-D movie we must put on our glasses and see the world through eyes of Faith. When we have the mind of Christ we can see what God sees, not just pain but potential, for ourselves and the world. We can impact those around us. Defy the laws of physics with our mouth by calling things that are not as though they were until they are!

When we receive the Spirit of Wisdom and Understanding our eyes will be enlightened!